Wednesday, September 2, 2009

“If any man think himself to be something, whereas he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.”(Gal. 6:3) Subject to many infirmities, man comes wailing into life, lives in fear, leaves it in anguish. Inconstant by nature, the sport of change, now he is glad, now he is sad. He needs everything, is dependent for everything, can do nothing of himself. He cannot guide himself; he is blind in his judgments. He regrets the past that is gone, is suspicious of the future; he grasps at the present which escapes him. He struggles against adversity. Prosperity intoxicates him, praise makes him proud; humiliation irritates and crushes him, anger makes him insane. Laziness enervates him; sensuality devours him. He is the plaything of his passions. His infancy is spent in helplessness, his youth in frivolity, his mature years in cares and worries, his old age in dotage. His mind is subject to ignorance, his will to uncertainty, his heart is tried by so many deceptions. Ennui inexorable weighs on his existence and he becomes a burden to himself. There is not a sense nor member of his body which does not know sorrow, which is not capable of suffering. There is not an instant of his life when he can believe himself safe, and the grave is always before him.What, then, is man? Nothing before he came into existence, nothing in revolt by sin, dust when his life ends, misery as long as it lasts. That is the condition of humanity caused by sin. It is this human condition, so infirm, so fallen, which became the condition of the Son of God, clothed in our flesh.Fr Thomas A Judge

This is so powerful b/c it illustrates so vividly what we are without redemption. And everyday I witness people who have responded to redemption and have climbed out of their grave.